Is blacksmith gear outpaced by raid gear?

[Rooflesstoofless]

After a long break from WoW I recently came back and leveled a DK. I didn't pursue any professions while leveling the toon so he has nothing at 85. I figured I could level professions while in the queue or when I don't have much time to be at my computer.

I wanted to go with Mining/Blacksmithing...but a buddy of mine says to go with a gather/gather setup because the gear offered by 4.1 (and beyond) will outpace the gear blacksmiths can create.

I've gone gather/gather since TBC and tired of it. I would rather have at least one production profession...

[Limulsuis]

Currently, Blacksmithing can do epic items with the same ilvl as the raids, the new dungeons in 4.1 have a lower ilvl than the raids, so blacksmithing will still be able to the best gear.

In the future tiers of content, there will be new recipes in the raids for new and updated items, but you need to raid to get them.

[Phantoms]

Another smart option would be to have your main character learn two production professions and possibly have a second character of yours have two gathering professions. That's what I do, at least.

[Dreogan]

It really depends on spec and class, to be honest.

Like I have a Prot pally. Some of the crafted epics are equal to current raid tier gear (the avoid/avoid pieces) while some of the pieces I wouldn't touch with a twenty foot pole, despite having a higher ilvl and more raw stats (the avoid/threat, chest if I remember correctly).

Do your research, figure out if the crafted pieces are worth the time and farming required for them (the Blue weapons are of note for being ridiculously over priced for their item budgets), and then choose from there. If you aren't going to be raiding any time within the next 3 months or so (the rough timeline for 4.2, the new raid tier and potentially new blacksmithing patterns), it might be worth it to go ahead and stick with blacksmithing. Plus the bonus sockets are always nice.

[DistortionSleep]

Also with blacksmithing you get another gem socket in gloves/bracers.

[Shanto94]

Blacksmithing is really good, a bit expensive to lvl.
If you manage to get JC, BS, Enchanting, Alchemy to max professions (on 2-3 different chars, you're chars only need to be 75 for this) then you got yourself good ways off making money while just sitting in a main city (All the professions are excelent for money making, and they can also be combined for even better money making.)
Going gathering/gathering isnt a too good idea imo.

[Constantino]

As with all crafted items, it created normal heroic gear. The stats more often than not are not optimal. They are meant as a progression peice, use them to perform in raid to replace them with the bis peice or heroic gear.

As for being a blacksmith, the gear is not bound to you so you can always take your ore and bring it to another blacksmith. You can pay alot of tips before you make up the gold spent on leveling (or ore used up if you prefer). Then you can get another gathering profession like herbalism, double your returns when you mind easy flying around searching for mining nodes.

[Delaios]

After a long break from WoW I recently came back and leveled a DK. I didn't pursue any professions while leveling the toon so he has nothing at 85. I figured I could level professions while in the queue or when I don't have much time to be at my computer.

I wanted to go with Mining/Blacksmithing...but a buddy of mine says to go with a gather/gather setup because the gear offered by 4.1 (and beyond) will outpace the gear blacksmiths can create.

I've gone gather/gather since TBC and tired of it. I would rather have at least one production profession...

The Zul Aman/Zul Gurub items are slightly below the epic items that crafting professions can make. When a new raid tier is released, new patterns/plans are usually implemented for blacksmithing, leatherworking and tailoring. In Ulduar patterns dropped for 226 iLvl stuff, in TotC 245 iLvl stuff and in ICC 264 iLvl stuff.
The starter PvP gear (the Bloodied set) will receive an upgrade when a new arena season starts.

[Breccia]

Blacksmithing items, like most crafted items, are supposed to at least get you started. For example, the crafted plate tank chest has +parry/+expertise. Not everyone wants the threat, but they do like the armor, stamina, and parry plus they can reforge the expertise. If you're a warrior, you use the BS crafted chest until you get something that's a bit more ideal...like the +parry/+mastery tank tier chest from valor points.

[Nume]

You also have to keep in mind that every blacksmithing item is BoE, so there is no reason you can't level a diff profession and still get said items. So it really comes down to if they are good moneymakers, and they still do make some but not as much as they used to. The only raid benefit you get from BS is the 2 extra sockets, which equates to 80 of a major stat.